"Can't sleep?" Muten Natsu noticed that the breathing of Orihime Inoue beside him still had not settled.
"Mm..." Orihime Inoue answered softly.
"When you're used to sleeping alone, having someone suddenly next to you can make it hard to fall asleep."
It sounded like he was speaking from experience... Orihime Inoue suddenly realized that Muten Natsu had already slept beside Retsu Unohana many times.
So sleeping together like this... probably was not anything especially unusual to Muten Natsu.
With that thought, the nervousness she had been feeling faded a little. She slowly turned over and lay flat on her back. "I'm okay..."
"Do you want to hear a lullaby?"
Orihime Inoue's eyes lit up. "Can I?"
"I'm not a very good singer."
"I want to hear it."
Muten Natsu turned onto his side and, copying the way Retsu Unohana did it, gently patted the blanket covering Orihime Inoue. "Sleep now, sleep now, my dear little one..."
Muten Natsu was not being modest. His voice was nowhere near as gentle as Retsu Unohana's, and his pitch was not nearly as steady either.
Amid the eternal song...
O eyes that know nothing...
Close gently...
I am right here...
As I weave with my own hands...
The unchanging cycle of this world...
Live on strongly...
Feeling a faint, dreamlike healing power on her body, Orihime Inoue closed her eyes and listened as the lullaby by her ear gradually grew softer and softer, while a warmth unlike anything she had ever known slowly spread through her.
That warmth overflowed little by little from the softest place in her heart, making her whole body feel lazy and limp.
She wanted to sink into this warmth forever.
This feeling... somehow...
It kind of feels wrong.
Orihime Inoue could not quite explain what was wrong, but when a man and a woman were lying in the same bed, should the atmosphere really feel like this?
Something was definitely off.
…
"This is not right!" Rukia Kuchiki suddenly opened her eyes, confusion filling them. "Something feels off."
She sat up with wide eyes and stared blankly at the wall in front of her.
What exactly felt wrong?
Full of doubts, Rukia Kuchiki walked out of her room, poured herself a glass of water, and slowly thought it over.
The instant her gaze landed on the door to Muten Natsu's room, a question rose in her mind.
Was there one person in there... or two?
...
Morning sunlight filtered through the curtains and landed on her face with a ticklish warmth.
Her long eyelashes trembled as Orihime Inoue slowly woke from a deep, comfortable sleep. Her eyes were still hazy with drowsiness when she opened them. "Enraku..."
She murmured the teddy bear's name, closed her eyes again, and hugged the warmth in her arms tighter, rubbing her cheek against it.
Enraku feels so warm today... Huh?
She suddenly realized something and snapped her eyes open.
What she was holding was not her teddy bear at all, but... Muten Natsu.
Her head was resting on Muten Natsu's arm, her arms wrapped around his body. The softness of her chest was pressed against him, forming a delicate curve, and one of her full thighs was draped across him. Even her white long socks had slipped into a mess of wrinkles, hanging from the tips of her feet.
"Ugh..." Orihime Inoue's face instantly turned bright red.
How... how did this happen... What happened last night...
It seemed like nothing had happened.
She had fallen asleep while listening to Muten Natsu's lullaby, and when she woke up, things had somehow turned out like this.
Muten Natsu had not left last night after all.
He had originally planned to leave.
But because of the Arrancar, he had been training at extreme intensity lately.
With Myōki's help, Muten Natsu had been able to push himself to the absolute limit, resting only when necessary.
The physical exhaustion went without saying, but the mental strain was even worse.
Fighting the Primordial Form came with dying over and over again, and the mental fatigue that built up from that could only be eased by proper sleep.
While singing a lullaby to Orihime Inoue, Muten Natsu had ended up being lulled to sleep himself.
His voice had not faded on purpose. Sleepiness had simply welled up and carried him off as well.
By now, lullabies and sleep had already become linked together through Retsu Unohana's influence.
Even if Muten Natsu sang one himself, he would still fall asleep by reflex.
And when a person fell asleep in a relaxed state, their sleeping posture naturally relaxed as well.
In that relaxed state... a lot of movements became instinctive.
For example, hugging the soft, sweet-smelling, warm presence beside him.
Orihime Inoue raised her eyes to look at his face, her glossy lips moving slightly.
If he is asleep, then even if I do something... he probably would not notice, right?
Nervously pressing her lips together, Orihime Inoue tried inching a little closer to Muten Natsu... No!
She took a deep breath and forced down the bold thought rising in her heart.
She could not do something like that.
Absolutely not.
She carefully loosened the arms wrapped around Muten Natsu, moved the leg resting on him away, and pushed herself up with her arms, trying to get out of bed.
She could not.
Orihime Inoue shifted her gaze and realized that her smooth long hair was pinned beneath Muten Natsu.
She tugged at it a little... It seemed like she could pull it free.
Orihime Inoue carefully pulled at her hair, only to suddenly notice a change in Muten Natsu's breathing.
He was about to wake up!
Orihime Inoue immediately closed her eyes, leaned back against him, and pretended she was still asleep.
"Mmm..." Muten Natsu let out a vague sound and tightened the arm around Orihime Inoue. "Hm?"
As if trying to confirm what was going on, Muten Natsu fumbled around blindly with his eyes still closed.
Orihime Inoue's body trembled slightly, but she did not dare move at all, stubbornly pretending she was still asleep.
Ugh... not there... please do not... do not squeeze there... mm...
Orihime Inoue shrank in a little. Her waist was very sensitive. If Muten Natsu kept squeezing there, she might really burst out laughing.
As if he had suddenly realized something, Muten Natsu's hand went stiff for a moment.
He opened his eyes, shifted his gaze slightly, and saw Orihime Inoue curled up in his arms.
Last night... Muten Natsu thought back for a moment and immediately found the key reason for how this had happened.
I should not have sung that lullaby.
Actually singing myself to sleep... seriously?
But now was not the time to think about that.
Muten Natsu loosened the arm around Orihime Inoue, gently lifted her head, pulled out the arm that had gone numb to the point where it barely felt like his anymore, set her head carefully back down on the pillow, and quietly got out of bed.
Orihime Inoue curled up slightly, her silky hair scattered messily across the bed, like sunlight from outside the window losing its way and lingering there unwilling to leave.
Muten Natsu patted her head, turned, opened the door, and stepped outside, gently closing it behind him.
The moment he looked up, he was met by Rukia Kuchiki's stern gaze.
"Rukia..." Muten Natsu rubbed his earlobe. "You're up early."
Rukia Kuchiki shot him a glance, noticed the little gesture, gave a soft snort, then turned her head away and ignored him.